I’ll never forget my university economics professor interrupting his own lecture to espouse the virtues of a flat tax for twenty minutes.
I didn’t know any better at the time, but now I roll my eyes at the memory.
If only we had more Keynesian and Marxian economists. Dr Wolff himself says that economics aren't nearly as complex as the courses would make you believe, and the formulas are intentionally complex to create an air of legitimacy.
Basically econ is a real thing that mostly serves as a right wing club to pretend austerity is good.
It's funny that every econ course starts with the supply/demand curve, as though competition is ever perfect. Modern business is all about barriers to entry and cashing out way more than the joke that is the supply/demand curve.
Hell, fast food in the past few years has gone to tiered pricing roughly based on income (your willingness to use their app and jump through particular hoops). Tell me how the supply/demand curve accounts for charging some people $4 and others $8 for the same burger?
It’s the same reason that you learn physicist and basic engineering in frictionless environments that only consider the obvious forces on the obvious vectors, while most of the work of mechanical and civil engineering in real life is spent dealing with friction in systems and sheering forces.
Except in this case the simplified lesson is misleading and damaging. Students leave that lesson and, unlike physics, believe that's how the real world works.
I don’t ever see the media talking about a flat tax as a good idea.
People in poverty would be fucked by it.
I remember when it was all the rage during the Ron Paul era. Took a while to get through to people why it's a terrible idea.
Steve Forbes tried to be President on a flat tax platform two decades ago and got absolutely roasted for it by everyone.
How about a flat tax rate? 10% across the board, all sources of income. None of this realized/unrealized gains crap, no tax shelters, none of that, all forms of wealth are taxable. If you made $15,000 last year, you owe $150 total. If your property increased in value by $1 million last year, you owe $10,000 for that.
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